See my new 'my bookshelf' page? I got lots of cookbooks, eh? Maybe even more than I will ever use. The guys in the house don't share my obsession but never mind, I enjoy reading them maybe even more than I enjoy cooking from them. There are 10 cookbooks not yet on the list, too. One of the problems of working in a bookshop (well, the main one) is that when new books get delivered, I get to unpack and shelve them - the bad part being that many of them are so appealing that they might never make it to the shelves - like half our supply of the new Penguin Great Food series. These beautifully designed slim volumes of food writing proved too appealing to resist - so home I went with 9 of them! A few days later, one of my friends shared this link to someone else's self-justifying cookbook buying article featuring just the series I mentioned!
The first one I am reading is 'A Middle Eastern Feast' by Claudia Roden. I'm learning all sorts of thugs. Here's an excerpt from a section called 'Sweet and Sour'
"Reading quite recently about ancient pre-Islamic Persia of the Sassanid and its Zoroastrian dualist religion, which is based on the confrontation of the two enemy forces of good and evil, I was struck by the similarity between the early philosophy of the Persians and principles of harmony which they apply to their food.
The Zoroastrian belief is that their god Ahouramazda created the world. The spirit of creation which pulled matter out of nothing awoke a force of resistance, giving birth to a spirit of evil, Angromainyous, whose creative and malicious urge was to destroy the harmony of the universe. In this religion, creation could only exist in the equilibrium of the opposing forces which it had aroused. (text skipped)
It is also interesting to compare the Middle Eastern 'sweet and sour' with that of China. The Chinese have a predilection for sweet and sour, and harmony through opposites, and their early religion was one also based on opposing forces of good and evil."
Then follows a recipe for a 'delicious way of preparing sweet-and-sour leeks' which, I have to admit, I haven't tried.
A recipe I might just try from the 10th book I've bought recently, Nirmala's Edible Diary (actually not even from my bookstore but another independent who was selling this beauty for $11 - down from $45!), is feijoa and pineapple punch. Feijoas? you ask… Ah, feijoas. We love them, us Kiwis, eh? Who else loves feijoas? I had thought Brazilians might, but the Brazilians, and for that matter other South Americans, I've asked about feijoas (some homesick days I can talk of little else) haven't even heard of them. 'What is that? Like Kiwifruit?' some ask. More like guava really, and, according to my new book, also like pineapple. Really? I suggest you just try some if you find them and then you'll know - they taste like feijoas. In New Zealand many people with good old, 1/4 acre sections have feijoa trees which produce bucketfuls of fruit which we usually just cut in half and scoop out the middle with a spoon - yum! They are not a huge commercial crop though and here in Australia, really hard to find. Indeed, there is a Facebook page called 'I love feijoas' which is mainly populated by homesick Kiwis (New Zealanders) living in Australia, asking each other if there's anywhere to buy them!
A Kiwi school friend, now based in London, is currently here in Perth for a work trip. This weekend I took her to a market and as we looked around she squealed with joy thinking she had found feijoas - she hadn't, they were small avocados and she was crestfallen - that's how much we love our feijoas. There may be little point in me telling you about them as they're hard to get but I'm sure ex-pats all have their favourite foods to miss - what can you think of?
Last night, while looking for chocolate actually, I stumbled across a small food store selling feijoas! I'll give them to my friend but in the meantime, the smell is just divine. If you don't stumble across any, you might instead enjoy 42 Below's feijoa Vodka.
Here is the cut in half style of feijoa and another, sharper South American fruit -tamarillo- that's a hit in NZ.
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